Baltimore Program Will Help Theater Students Go To College

BALTIMORE (WJZ) — A new collaboration was announced Monday, setting the stage to make college a reality for more theater students in Baltimore.

Mary Bubala reports it basically connects the best in the business here in Baltimore and nationwide with students who are ready to learn.

Students at the Baltimore School for the Arts dream of studying theater in college. But for some, test scores, finances and other barriers exist.

Now the University of Baltimore is teaming up with the Everyman Theater and the Hippodrome Foundation to form a degree program called Performance Studies: Baltimore.

“We have a lot of resident artists who are teachers and they live here and work here and make this their cultural home and their artist tap root in this community and these people can be a resource to the youngsters coming up who have a dream but not the resources,” said Donald Hicken, Baltimore School for the Arts.

A pilot program will launch this fall and expand in years to come.

“If you have a passion for the arts but think there’s no way, think again. So many people! We’ve got outstanding professors, wonderful partners in the community,” said University of Baltimore President Kurt Schmoke.

The UB program will draw from the deep pool of talent that cycles through the Hippodrome every season and a solid group of local professionals from the Everyman Theater.

“Giving them our expertise and offering master classes and hopefully as the program grows, creating projects that go on for a couple weeks,” said Bruce Nelson, Everyman Theater.

Students will develop their careers through experimental learning, rigor and mentoring.

“The UB community and the arts community are separate so this program is definitely going to create an opportunity for those two worlds to intermingle more,” said UB student Bryonna Edwards.

The UB admissions office is sponsoring an information session for potential students on Tuesday, June 21, inside the Wright Theater.